


Together We Believe

by IShouldBeWriting



Category: Jewish Scripture & Legend, The X-Files
Genre: Collection: Purimgifts Day 2, Gen, Ibbur (Jewish Scripture & Legends), Jewish Character, Judaism, Reincarnation, Transmigration, i can't believe there's not a tag for that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-25
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2019-03-24 00:53:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13799946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IShouldBeWriting/pseuds/IShouldBeWriting
Summary: Scully and Mulder visit Mulder's cousin to investigate a case.  But is it a case, or a matter of faith?





	Together We Believe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wendelah1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendelah1/gifts).



> I don't think we ever see mention anywhere of what Mulder's family background is but since the surname is either Dutch or German in origin, I've decided to headcanon that his family is Jewish even if he isn't observant himself.

“Hey Scully, Have you seen my copy of the Talmud? I can’t find it,” crouched down on hands and knees, Fox Mulder was the picture of everything Dana Scully had come to expect of her partner after this many years of working together.

Spying the spine of one of the texts stacked on his desk, she pointed. “That one?”

Mulder rose on his knees like a meerkat on alert, inspected the book in question, then shook his head. “Wrong one. This one’s still in manuscript format. It’s a translation of the Babylonian being done by Rabbi Steinsaltz Even-Yisrael. I was hoping to take it to New York with me.”

“New York?” His redheaded partner asked as his search expanded into a filing cabinet.

Mulder waves his hand towards his desk where she saw his open briefcase with a train ticket and a growing stack of reading material. “I got a call from a cousin of mine the other night. He mentioned in passing that one of his Yeshiva students has an understanding of the Mishnah far more advanced than he can explain, even for someone being raised in an orthodox community. But there’s a theory I’ve heard of and always wanted to investigate that might explain it.”

Scully rolled her eyes. “Is that one ticket for New York, Mulder, or two?”

\-----

While wearing acceptable clothing for an orthodox Jewish community wasn't difficult for Dana Scully, figuring out how to keep the scarf covering her hair on was.

“I don't know how they do this every day,” she muttered to her partner as they waited outside his cousin’s classroom.

“Practice,” Mulder shot back, nonplussed. “And a specific kind of hair clips.” He gestured to the glitter-covered clips that held in place the scarf of a passing female student.

The door to the classroom opened releasing a stream of children before Dana had the chance to reply. A man who looked a surprisingly amount like Mulder, only with a skullcap and two long curls on either side of his head waved for them to come inside.

“You made it!” He cried, embracing her partner and clapping him on the back enthusiastically before smiling and nodding in her direction. “And you must be Dana. I've heard so much about you.”

“Uh, it’s wonderful to meet you -” she began and was saved yet again from having to admit to not knowing his name by the man’s enthusiasm.

“Aaron. Fox’s father is my father’s first cousin. Our parents haven't kept in touch but Fox and I did. We’ve always shared an interest in the wondrous and unexplained,” he looked at her partner fondly.

Dana shook her head, the corners of her mouth turning up in a small, indulgent smile.

“Why don't you tell us about this student of yours?”

Aaron checked his watch and grinned. “Better than tell, I’ll show you. Come, _minchah_  should just be finished.”

\-----

  
“ _Lo_! A man so learned as Rav Gaon would never have mistaken these things for each other!”

The voice was just as heated in its argument as the rest but could be heard clearly, a young boy’s oboe floating above the deeper bassoons of his elders. Aaron motioned them to a halt outside the door.

“Levi,” he motioned to the child sitting in the room full of men. “He has been attending  _minchah_ with our rabbinical students for a few months now and as you can see, his arguments are far beyond his years.”

Beside her, Mulder was already digging through his briefcase for the manuscript he’d brought, trying to cross-reference the argument they were having.

Scully caught his eye as he stood up again. “Want to fill me in?”

“The material Levi is drawing from normally takes decades of scholarship to learn much less understand deeply enough to be arguing the viewpoints of multiple Rabbis. He’s,” Mulder turned to look at his cousin for confirmation, “barely ten years old, Scully. The fact that he knows the names of all of these Rabbis, much less the laws being argued is outside the realm of possibility -”

“Unless,” his cousin picked up the words for him, the gleam in his eye, telling Dana that this was why the two men had stayed in touch and why they had been brought there, “unless you are willing to consider that the boy might be host to an _ibbur_.”

Dana didn't need words this time. A single raised her eyebrow was more than enough.

“Judaism believes in a form of transmigration of souls where one who was truly righteous in life and unable to complete their work may temporarily return by possessing a living person. It is a voluntary coexistence, a gift given by the living to the dead who wish to fulfill a _mitzvah_ which they can only complete in the flesh. For one so young to be chosen? Levi must truly be special.”

Though she had been listening to the explanation, Dana had also been watching the young boy as he argued with men two and three times his age. Like them, his arguments were vehement as he pointed to his books and pounded on the table. Was it possession, the weight of knowledge and age beyond his true years? Or just a child with an eidetic memory who had learned to mimic his elders’ body language? Mulder and his cousin wanted to believe. And something Dana had finally learned from this many years of working with him was that truth was highly subjective. Sometimes people needed the hope that came with believing more than they needed the realities of everyday life.

“So,” she asked, “how do we test to see if Levi is possessed by an _ibbur_?”


End file.
